It seemed that everywhere I looked this summer, there was a Great Blue Heron. I did some private photo instructions for a person who really likes them. We did not plan to look for them, and I told her not to expect to see any. But in the two plus hours we were together we saw 4.
In the old days of slide film it seemed much harder to get a decent photo of one. Perhaps they are more acclimated to people these days, but I suspect excellent AF, high ISO with reasonably low noise, and fast burst capabilities of the current generation of DLSRs raise the odds considerably.
They are interesting, large, sometimes graceful, beautiful birds. You definitely do not want to canoe or kayak under their nests. Their defence mechanism is to dump the partially-digested fish they were going to feed their young on you.
Two slide shows follow. Be sure to see the second one because it shows how I got the heron to dance.
You saw the dancing GBH at the top of this page. How did I get it to dance for me? Here is the real story with 8 photos taken in a bit less than 2 seconds.
